HORACE MANN EDUCATORS CORP /DE/

To the Shareholders and Board of Directors

Horace Mann Educators Corporation:

Opinion on the Consolidated Financial Statements

We have audited the accompanying consolidated balance sheets of Horace Mann Educators Corporation and subsidiaries (the Company) as of December 31, 2025 and 2024, the related consolidated statements of operations and comprehensive income (loss), changes in shareholders’ equity, and cash flows for each of the years in the three-year period ended December 31, 2025, and the related notes and financial statement schedules I to IV (collectively, the consolidated financial statements). In our opinion, the consolidated financial statements present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of the Company as of December 31, 2025 and 2024, and the results of its operations and its cash flows for each of the years in the three-year period ended December 31, 2025, in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles.

We also have audited, in accordance with the standards of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (United States) (PCAOB), the Company’s internal control over financial reporting as of December 31, 2025, based on criteria established in Internal Control – Integrated Framework (2013) issued by the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission, and our report dated February 27, 2026 expressed an unqualified opinion on the effectiveness of the Company’s internal control over financial reporting.

Basis for Opinion

These consolidated financial statements are the responsibility of the Company’s management. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these consolidated financial statements based on our audits. We are a public accounting firm registered with the PCAOB and are required to be independent with respect to the Company in accordance with the U.S. federal securities laws and the applicable rules and regulations of the Securities and Exchange Commission and the PCAOB.

We conducted our audits in accordance with the standards of the PCAOB. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the consolidated financial statements are free of material misstatement, whether due to error or fraud. Our audits included performing procedures to assess the risks of material misstatement of the consolidated financial statements, whether due to error or fraud, and performing procedures that respond to those risks. Such procedures included examining, on a test basis, evidence regarding the amounts and disclosures in the consolidated financial statements. Our audits also included evaluating the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the consolidated financial statements. We believe that our audits provide a reasonable basis for our opinion.

Critical Audit Matters

The critical audit matters communicated below are matters arising from the current period audit of the consolidated financial statements that were communicated or required to be communicated to the audit committee and that: (1) relate to accounts or disclosures that are material to the consolidated financial statements and (2) involved our especially challenging, subjective, or complex judgments. The communication of critical audit matters does not alter in any way our opinion on the consolidated financial statements, taken as a whole, and we are not, by communicating the critical audit matters below, providing separate opinions on the critical audit matters or on the accounts or disclosures to which they relate.

Fair value for hard-to-value fixed maturity securities

As discussed in Note 3 to the consolidated financial statements, as of December 31, 2025, the Company has recorded an estimated fair value for fixed maturity securities, of which a portion represents securities that are hard-to-value, which are primarily securities that use Level 3 (unobservable) inputs. The Company estimates the fair value of hard-to-value fixed maturity securities, which includes securities that do not have observable market-based inputs or prices or that trade in markets that are less liquid. The Company uses judgment to determine the appropriate inputs and assumptions used to estimate the fair value of these hard-to-value securities. As of December 31, 2025, the estimated fair value of fixed maturity securities was $5,714.6 million.

We identified the assessment of the Company’s estimate of the fair value of hard-to-value fixed maturity securities as a critical audit matter. Significant measurement uncertainty associated with the fair value of such securities existed because the markets for the hard-to-value securities are less liquid and there is a lack of observable marked-based inputs. As such, there was a high degree of subjectivity and judgment in evaluating the fair value and, specifically, the benchmark yield used in the valuation. Additionally, evaluation of the benchmark yield used in the estimation of fair value required specialized skills and knowledge.

The following are the primary procedures we performed to address this critical audit matter. We, with involvement of valuation professionals with specialized skills and knowledge, evaluated the design and tested the operating effectiveness of certain internal controls over the Company’s process to measure fair value of hard-to-value securities. This included controls related to the Company’s selection of pricing assumptions, including the benchmark yield used to value hard-to-value fixed maturity securities. We involved valuation professionals with specialized skills and knowledge, who assisted in:

•developing an independent range of fair value estimates using information from the Company, market data sources, models, and key assumptions derived by the valuation professional for a selection of securities.

•comparing the Company’s fair value estimates of hard-to-value securities to our independent range of fair value estimates for the same selection of securities.

Valuation of the liability for property and casualty unpaid claims and claim expense reserves

As discussed in Notes 1 and 5 of the consolidated financial statements, the Company employs actuarial techniques to estimate the liability for property and casualty unpaid claims and claim expense reserves (reserves). The Company develops reserves based on the application of actuarial methods and best estimate assumptions to historical claim experience. The reserves are continually updated by the Company as experience develops and new information becomes known. The Company recorded an estimated liability of $303.3 million for property and casualty unpaid claims and claim expense reserves as of December 31, 2025.

We identified the assessment of the estimate of reserves as a critical audit matter because it involved estimation uncertainty. Complex auditor judgment and specialized skills and knowledge were required in evaluating the selected methods and certain assumptions used to develop the estimate of reserves for certain lines of business representing higher estimation uncertainty, including the selection of development factors and changes in claim frequency and severity trends. Additionally, subjective auditor judgment was required to assess the selected assumptions as there exists a range of potential inputs and the assumptions are sensitive to variation, such that minor changes in the assumptions could affect the reserves recorded by the Company.

The following are the primary procedures we performed to address this critical audit matter. We, with involvement of actuarial professionals with specialized skills and knowledge, evaluated the design and tested the operating effectiveness of certain internal controls over the Company’s process for the development of the estimate of reserves. This included controls related to the methods and assumptions used for the Company’s best estimate. We also involved actuarial professionals with specialized skills and knowledge, who assisted in:

•evaluating the Company’s reserving methods, procedures, key assumptions, and judgments by comparing to actuarial standards of practice.

•developing an independent range of reserves for certain lines of business that were determined to represent higher estimation uncertainty based on actuarial methodologies and assumptions in order to evaluate the Company’s consolidated reserves.

•assessing movement of the Company’s recorded reserves within the range of independent reserves for certain lines of business.

•examining the Company's methods, certain assumptions, and results of their internal actuarial analyses for certain lines of business that were determined to represent higher estimation uncertainty in order to evaluate the Company's consolidated reserves.

/s/ KPMG LLP

We have served as the Company’s auditor since 1989.

Columbus, Ohio

February 27, 2026